This invention relates generally to apparatus for peeling fruits and vegetables. More particularly, it relates to apparatus for removing the skin from such fruits and vegetables on which the skin has already been loosened by immersion in a hot liquid solution, by steam, or by steam and vacuum. In a typical process of this nature the fruits and vegetables, which may typically include apricots, nectarines, plums, applies, pears, tomatoes, potatoes or other types, are initially immersed in a hot caustic solution or treated with steam, which causes the peel to be loosened from the flesh of the fruit or vegetable but not removed from it.
A number of different methods have been developed to complete the removal of the skin from the fruit or vegetable. A common method is the use of storing jets of water that flush the loosened peel from the fruit or vegetable. While this procedure is effective, it produces large volumes of waste liquid containing the water from the jets, the pieces of peel and traces of the caustic solution. This waste liquid presents disposal and pollution problems that are becoming unacceptable for commercial operations.
In order to reduce the excessive use of water and the production of waste liquid, apparatus has been developed to remove the loosened skins by abrasion, pinching by rollers and by other similar devices. Two such devices are described in the applicant's patents U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,444,096 and 5,033,372, in which a plurality rotatable peeling elements are supported on a support structure for rotation. The peeling elements engage the fruit or vegetable to be peeled. As the vegetables or fruit move from one element to the next the items to be peeled often rotate in the same direction about their axes leaving areas of the item that do not come into engagement with the peeling elements.